1991 - Two visionary women—Sondra Shaw-Hardy and Martha Taylor—establish the National Network of Women as Philanthropists (NNWP) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
1992 - Two-day conference on women and philanthropy, one of the first of its kind, is held at Wingspread in Racine, Wisconsin.
1995 - Sondra Shaw-Hardy and Martha Taylor publish Reinventing Fundraising.
1997 - NNWP becomes the Women’s Philanthropy Institute and is incorporated as a free-standing nonprofit.
2004 - WPI moves to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.
2005 - Andrea Pactor joins WPI and oversees its first symposium on women’s philanthropy: Women & Philanthropy: Gaining Momentum.
2006 - WPI publishes The Transformative Power of Women’s Philanthropy.
2007 - WPI and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) hold joint conference, (Re)Defining Philanthropy: Rich Conversations.
2008 - Debra Mesch joins WPI as director; Inaugural Shaw-Hardy Taylor Achievement award is presented to Sondra Shaw-Hardy and Martha Taylor at WPI’s second symposium, Moving Women’s Philanthropy Forward: Influences, Intent, Impact.
2009 - First WPI Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship is awarded to Deborah Skolnick Einhorn; First WPI Council is formed (inaugural members include Kim Davis, Edith Falk, Trish Jackson, Kathleen Loehr, Michele Minter, Ellen Remmer, Marcela Rovzar, Melanie Sabelhaus, Elizabeth Somerset, Becky Sykes, and Lisa Witter); WPI organizes its first annual panel on topics in women’s philanthropy at the Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action (ARNOVA) conference.
2010 - WPI and New York Times Knowledge Network partner to offer online course Women & Philanthropy: The Time is Now; First annual Women Give report on income, marital status, and causes women support is released.
2011 - Third symposium, Women Worldwide Leading through Philanthropy, is held in Chicago.
2012 - WPI hosts the first SHEMAKESCHANGE online conference to explore attitudes towards money, risk-taking, and other factors that affect women’s philanthropic choices.
2013 - The endowment of the Eileen Lamb O’Gara Chair in Women’s Philanthropy is announced,made possible by a gift from Maureen and Jim Hackett.
2014 - The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awards its first of four grants to WPI to accelerate research on giving by women and men, leading to grants totaling $5 million over the next 6 years.
2015 - Debra Mesch is named Eileen Lamb O’Gara Chair, and begins teaching the graduate-level course, Gender and Philanthropy—the first comprehensive, interdisciplinary course in the field.
2019 - The #IAmAPhilanthropist video campaign launches in partnership with YWCA Metropolitan Chicago and Facebook to complement WPI’s tenth annual Women Give report on gender and giving across communities of color—the first study to explore the intersection of race, giving and gender.
2020 - Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, WPI cancels its fourth symposium and repurposes the content to launch Philanthropy Plugged In, a comprehensive digital hub and podcast series to spark conversation around the intersection of technology, gender, and giving—the theme of WPI’s 11th annual Women Give; Jeannie Infante Sager is announced as WPI’s new director.
